This Friday, We the Hispanos. España, raíz de Estados Unidos arrives on our screens, the new documentary by José Luis López-Linares. Indeed, following the success of España, la primera globalización (2021) and Hispanoamérica. Canto de vida y esperanza (2024), the director completes today a fascinating trilogy on the weight of our homeland in universal history. Specifically, and as its title indicates, this film aims to delve into the influence that Hispanicity has exerted and continues to exert on the United States.
Before beginning, allow me, dear reader, a light-hearted joke. A few years ago, in an effort to counter the American cultural invasion, the following quip went viral: “I won’t celebrate Halloween until I see a Holy Week procession there.” Well, if anyone ever echoed that phrase, know that they should start preparing their costume, since the documentary begins precisely with a massive procession… in the streets of New York! Of course, I won’t be the one to encourage celebrating a festivity that has nothing to do with us, but it serves as the perfect excuse to begin this humble review.
That’s right, like it or not, there are more than five hundred years of history connecting the United States with Spain. However, that deep footprint—explorers, missionaries, cultural values, and everyday contributions—has been unjustly relegated to oblivion in the (self-interested) narrative of our days. Through this documentary, then, López-Linares sets out to rescue it with historical rigor, visual beauty, and an educational approach that makes it accessible to the viewer.
In this way, the film tours fascinating figures such as Francisco Vázquez de Coronado, Bernardo de Gálvez—whose aid was key in the American War of Independence—, the Spanish mystic Sor María de Jesús de Ágreda, or the Mallorcan saint Junípero Serra, whose missions shaped the landscape and spirituality of present-day California. But it goes far beyond illustrious names: it shows how the charros from Salamanca evolved into the American cowboy—in our colorful slang, the vaquero—, how the Spanish Tinge influenced the birth of the blues or jazz—pay attention to the beautiful words that one of its founders, Jelly Roll Morton, directs toward Spanish music—or how Mexican baroque and gastronomic traditions remain alive in the everyday culture of a country where Hispanics already exceed 70 million people.
With careful cinematography—handled by the director himself along with Andrés Recio Illán—, an original evocative soundtrack by Jorge Magaz, and precise editing by Pablo Blanco Guzmán, We the Hispanos is an enveloping cinematic journey. It includes testimonies from historians, experts, and especially voices of Hispanic Americans who feel and love that legacy of their Spanish ancestors. It’s not just about looking to the past, but about understanding the present and projecting the future: Hispanicity, with its religiosity, patriotism, sense of honor, and capacity for miscegenation, can precisely provide the values that the complex American identity of the 21st century needs.
López-Linares has said it clearly: first you must remember to then awaken. And this documentary achieves it masterfully. It’s not an exercise in nostalgia, but an invitation to recognize that the history of the United States cannot be understood without Spain and Hispanicity. In a time of identity debates, We the Hispanos, then, offers a serene, well-founded, and deeply positive view of what unites us. For this reason, the viewer will leave with the certainty that Hispanicity is not a marginal chapter, but one of the pillars on which the American country has been built—and can continue to enrich itself.
On the other hand, the documentary premieres at a propitious moment, as July 4th of this same year will mark the 250th anniversary of the independence of the United States. Few audiovisual documents will arrive with as much timeliness and force as this one. If God wills it, it will stir consciences and increase the pride of those of us who love our history.
Ah! One more note. Given what we’ve seen, and since the film will burst onto screens there in full October, don’t rule out, dear reader, that the Halloween pumpkins end up yielding to the Holy Week candles. And as for those who swore up and down that they would never dress up until there was a procession in New York… go ahead and dust off your most somber outfits!
(No, please: it was just a joke).